Writing Box with Portrait of Fujiwara no Ietaka and His Poem about the Tatsuta River

Writing Box with Portrait of Fujiwara no Ietaka and His Poem about the Tatsuta River

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The poem on the outside of the lid is rendered in fine hiramaki-e, imitating calligraphy in ink. The inside of the box is embellished with colorful maple leaves in a river on nashiji ground. The poem, by Fujiwara no Ietaka (1158–1237), is about the Tatsuta River in Nara Prefecture: Tatsuta gawa momiji o tozuru usugō ri wataraba kore mo naka ya taenan On Tatsuta River a layer of red maple leaves is trapped within thin ice, and if we were to go across the brocade would be torn. —Trans. John T. Carpenter

Asian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Writing Box with Portrait of Fujiwara no Ietaka and His Poem about the Tatsuta RiverWriting Box with Portrait of Fujiwara no Ietaka and His Poem about the Tatsuta RiverWriting Box with Portrait of Fujiwara no Ietaka and His Poem about the Tatsuta RiverWriting Box with Portrait of Fujiwara no Ietaka and His Poem about the Tatsuta RiverWriting Box with Portrait of Fujiwara no Ietaka and His Poem about the Tatsuta River

The Met's collection of Asian art—more than 35,000 objects, ranging in date from the third millennium B.C. to the twenty-first century—is one of the largest and most comprehensive in the world. Each of the many civilizations of Asia is represented by outstanding works, providing an unrivaled experience of the artistic traditions of nearly half the world.